There's no love song finer

I did the strangest thing today. Well, strange is perhaps not the right word, rather, out of the ordinary. See, today I sat down and played the piano. That's something I haven't done since I don't know when. I've been using the piano lately just to play a chord so I know which key to sing in. But hubby took our big boy to his therapeutic art classes and I asked him to take the rest of the gang with him so I could have an hour or two of peace and quiet. So I sang for about an hour. And when I finished, I thought, gees, I haven't played the ebony and ivory in a while. So I sat down and started tinkling a bit. Then I took out my favourite music books from uni, "The Thirties" and "The Forties" and started playing a bit of Gershwin, Rodgers & Hart and then Cole Porter. And then I played it (rather badly, mind you), one of my favourite Cole Porter songs ever. "Every time we say goodbye".

What a great friggin' song, man. It was written by Porter in 1946 and hasn't lost any of its charm since, as have none of the other songs from that era and before. From Ella Fitzgerald to Ray Charles to Annie Lennox to (I found out today) Robbie Williams, it seems that everyone has their version of the song. And I've gotta admit, I'd like to do a version of it too with my Julie Andrews-ish voice. But I would do it with what I like to call the "recitative" at the beginning which it seems no one does. This is how it goes with the recitative at the beginning:
We love each other so deeply
That I ask you this, sweetheart
Why should we quarrel ever
Why can't we be enough clever, never to part

Ev'ry time we say goodbye
I die a little
Ev'ry time we say goodbye
I wonder why a little
Why the gods above me
Who must be in the know
Think so little of me
They allow you to go
When you're near there's such an air
Of spring about it
I can hear the larks somewhere
Begin to sing about it
There's no love song finer
But how strange the change from major to minor
Ev'ry time we say goodbye

And the song rings so true. Don't we all die a little when we say goodbye to someone we love? Don't we ask the Gods, but why, why does it have to be so? I can tell ya, I do. But maybe that's just me being the soppy romantic I am...

Personally, my absolute favourite part of the song is when Porter literally goes from a major to minor key in the words "There's no love song finer, but how strange the change from major to minor, every time we say goodbye". He's doing a bit of a Gerswhin here, but it's nonetheless an absolutely, bloody brilliant little musical twist.

And here's my favourite version of the song sung by someone I consider to be the absolute best pop singer of the mid-eighties, one of the few female singers of the era who had some grey matter between her ears - Annie Lennox. Enjoy!